New music review: Comedown Machine, the Strokes (RCA)

Did we really embrace these guys in 2001 as a breath of rock n’ roll fresh air only to watch helplessly a decade later as they turn into anemic 1980s apologists? If someone had told us back then that they would one day record a song like One Way Trigger, which bafflingly borrows from a-ha’s Take on Me, we would never have believed it.

They have clearly had their troubles: singer Julian Casablancas literally mailed in his vocals for their last disc, Angles. This time, the band managed to be in the same room, but failed to come up with a cohesive album. Most of the these tracks are simply puzzling and hard to focus on. Take the prog-salsa of Tap Out or the keyboards that wish they were cellos on `80s Comedown Machine … please.

There is still a bit of life in the band’s full-on chordal assault, the precision of its unison riffs and the clearly-defined interplay of all five members, most evident in All the Time, 50/50 and Partners In Crime. On the whole, though, `80s Comedown Machine unwittingly provides the disc’s discouraging mission statement with its title: the era that informs it, the disappointment that comes with it and the robotic lack of personality that sinks it.

Rating: **

Podworthy: 50/50

Comedown Machine will be available March 26. Here’s the video for All the Time:

And click here to listen to the whole album, courtesy of the people at Pitchfork Media.

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